News

Table of Contents

  1. 21st Biennial Meeting of the American Quaternary Association
  2. Update on the Status of the Quaternary
  3. Minutes from Council Meeting, Monday, October 29, 2007
  4. Proposed Amendments to the AMQUA Bylaws
  5. Field Notes
  6. Climate of the Past

21st Biennial Meeting of the American Quaternary Association

August 12-16, 2010 University of Wyoming Laramie, Wyoming

Exploring the Pleistocene-Holocene Boundary in the Americas: From Molecules to Continents

Local Chair: Steve Jackson Jackson@uwyo.edu
Scientific Program Chairs: Rolfe Mandel mandel@ku.edu and David Meltzer dmeltzer@smu.edu

The University of Wyoming will host the 21st Biennial Meeting of the American Quaternary Association (AMQUA) August 12-16, 2010. The University has ample facilities for the meeting, and hotels and restaurants in Laramie are within walking distance of the campus (below).

Scientific Program:

The scientific program will focus on a variety of issues related the Pleistocene-Holocene transition in the Americas. Some of the specific topics that will be addressed are as follows:

  • Dating the Pleistocene-Holocene transition, including current calibration efforts and issues of radiocarbon variation and its effects.
  • Climate and environmental change at the Pleistocene-Holocene transition. What was the nature of the transition? How rapidly did change occur? Scales and thresholds of change and how these vary.
  • Causes of climatic and environmental change at the Pleistocene-Holocene transition. Role of Milankovitch forcing functions vs. greenhouse gasses. What triggers abrupt climate change? What caused the Younger Dryas?
  • Ancient DNA and the genetic consequences of environmental change during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition.
  • Landscape response to climatic change during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition: glacial, fluvial, eolian, and lacustrine systems.

Field Trips:

  • North Park and Middle Park, Colorado (2-day): high basins (7000-8000’) surrounded by high mountains (Park Range, Front Range etc.). Features: Paleoindian and other archeological sites, glacial and periglacial geomorphology, active dunefields, paleoecological and paleohydrological studies, grassland and steppe to tundra. Visit Lindenmeier archeological site on return.
  • Laramie Basin and Snowy Range (1-day): 7000’ valley floor and 10,000’ crest (with summits to 12,000’); Pleistocene blowout basins and playas; periglacial features (mima mounds, frost wedges & polygons); glacial features (cirques, moraines, paternoster lakes, etc.); shortgrass prairie and steppe to tundra; archeological sites from Late Paleoindian to horse culture; outwash fans; ecological and climatological sensor arrays; paleoecological sites (lakes and peatlands)
  • Cheyenne Basin and Hartville Uplift (1-day): 5000’-6000’; mixed-grass prairie; classical archeological sites including Hell Gap (stratified Paleoindian camp site), Spanish Diggings (quarry sites); Agate Basin (Pleistocene/Holocene transition site)

The field-trip committee may collapse these trips into two, by merging the Laramie Plains and Hartville Uplift trip, or adding the Lindenmeier site visit to the Hartville Uplift trip. More details will be provided later.

More information concerning the field trips and scientific program is forthcoming.

Update on the Status of the Quaternary

I am writing to provide a short summary of recent developments in the debate about the status of the “Quaternary”in the Geological Time Scale (GTS). At times, this saga comes dangerously close to becoming a soap opera, but it has serious implications for Quaternary scientists and involves complex discussions and negotiations among INQUA, IUGS (International Union for Geological Sciences), and ICS (International Commission on Stratigraphy). Last summer, after four years of lively discussions between INQUA and ICS, and after INQUA had polled the Quaternary community about the status of the Quaternary, a compromise solution was reached. INQUA endorsed a proposal by ICS to retain the Quaternary as a system and a period with its base at 2.6 Ma, corresponding to the base of the Gelasian Stage. Under this compromise, the Gelasian, which is currently the uppermost stage of the Pliocene Epoch, would be transferred to the Quaternary. The Quaternary Period would follow the Neogene Period, which along with the Paleogene, would replace the Tertiary as periods and systems. The proposal thus would establish three periods in the Cenozoic – Paleogene, Neogene, and Quaternary. The Tertiary would continue to be used, but as an informal unit.

Last summer, ICS, with INQUA’s blessing, submitted the proposal to IUGS, its parent body. IUGS responded by formally accepting the Quaternary as a period/system. To both INQUA’s and ICS’s surprise, however, it did not agree to moving the base of the Quaternary from its current position (1.8 Ma) to 2.6 Ma, which is favored by most Quaternary scientists. IUGS argued that the change would violate stratigraphic rules (i.e., no change could be made before 2008). It called on INQUA and ICS to reconsider the status of the Tertiary, which would lose its formal status under the compromise proposal, and to further discuss their recommended changes to the Geological Time Scale with interested parties. A proposal to change the Time Scale will not be considered until the International Geological Congress in Oslo in 2008.

So, we are currently living with the “status quo”– a Quaternary Period with a base at 1.8 Ma. INQUA will not rest until the base of the Quaternary is set at 2.6 Ma, a much more logical pinning point to what we all know is the most important, albeit shortest, period of geologic time. Brad Pillans, President of the INQUA Commission on Stratigraphy and Chronology, and Phil Gibbard, President of the ICS Subcommission on the Quaternary, are preparing a collection of short papers on the Quaternary for publication as an issue of Episodes. This issue will be published in time for the International Geological Congress in Oslo. John J. Clague
Past-President, INQUA

Minutes from Council Meeting, Monday, October 29, 2007

The minutes can be read here.

Proposed Amendments to the AMQUA Bylaws

At the October 29, 2007 meeting of the AMQUA Council in Denver, the Council recommended a series of amendments to the bylaws to accommodate actual practices for reinstating members, conducting online elections, and conversion of the newsletter to electronic format. In accord with the AMQUA Constitution, recommended amendments to the bylaws must be circulated to the membership at least 90 days before the biennial meeting and approved by 2/3 of the voting members at the biennial meeting. Click for details …

Please review these recommended amendments and send any comments to Bonnie Styles, AMQUA Secretary, Illinois State Museum, 1011 East Ash Street, Springfield, IL 62703-3500, styles@museum.state.il.us. Members will vote on the proposed amendments at the 2008 Biennial Meeting at Penn State.

Field Notes

Steve Porter is engaged in a study of the paleomonsoon history of the southern Qinghai Lake Basin on the northeastern Tibetan Plateau, a project funded by NSF and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Click for details and photos …

Climate of the Past

Climate of the Past" (CP) is open access, on-line journal of the European Geosciences Union, affiliated with the Climate division. This journal is free, and you can download anything you want. Page charges are very low. CP was launched in June 2005 and will receive its first impact factor this coming summer. -- Denis-Didier Rousseau, co-editor in chief